I've said for a long time, that our liberties are stolen away from us by the political left in incremental, sometimes barely perceptible moves. So much of the allegedly free populace of Western nations has become so obviously and pathetically castrated and anesthetized by the political left that we forget that our liberties are not theirs for the taking. The only way, as Steyn rightly points out is to exersise liberty on a daily basis.

That means being free on a micro level all the time, instead of despairing about the macro picture. Now don't get me wrong, the macro picture is truly dreadful. But we all have it in our powers to live freely on a micro level, within our own circles, and our own communities. And if you don't live freely in your own sphere, with your own children, within your own life, then you are part of the problem. It means do what you can and not what you can't. And for goooodnesssssssake stop kvetching about what we "can't" do.

They can only get away with it if we let them.

If we let them frame the terms of the debate, if we let them frame the language, if we let them tell us what we "can" and can't say, what we can and can't think, what we can and not joke about, what costumes we can wear, what jokes we can tell, what songs we can sing, if we acquiesce so willingly and so pathetically to the SHUT UP, then we can and must only blame ourselves for our loss of liberty.

I think you will find it's a very insightful and,complimentary piece to Mark Steyn's remarks.

He notes, describing the Trump wave:

"Express the “wrong” opinions in British or American politics or academia and it’s the (figurative) gulag for you; if you work at a fast-food place, the consequences are generally less steep. But when enough ordinary voters express an opinion, the elites may feel safer, too."

"In his terrific book, Private Truths, Public Lies:The Social Consequences of Preference Falsification, Timur Kuran writes about the phenomenon he calls “preference falsification”: People tend to hide unpopular views to avoid ostracism or punishment; they stop hiding them when they feel safe."

You get it my friend? Crazy as it may seem, the "best" part about Donald Trump is that he is creating a "safe space" for sane citizens of democracies in general and in America specifically.

That is to say: forget the wall with Mexico forget the hotels and casinos. This endeavor could be the most impressive and YUGEST thing Donald Trump ever actually built! Patriotic and civilized "safe space" for non-leftists. Imagine that.

What does this "safe space" also create? Back to Professor Reynolds:

"This can produce rapid change: In totalitarian societies like the old Soviet Union, the police and propaganda organizations do their best to enforce preference falsification. Such regimes have little legitimacy, but they spend a lot of effort making sure that citizens don't realize the extent to which their fellow-citizens dislike the regime. If the secret police and the censors are doing their job, 99% of the populace can hate the regime and be ready to revolt against it — but no revolt will occur because no one realizes that everyone else feels the same way."

Thus:

"This works until something breaks the spell and the discontented realize that their feelings are widely shared, at which point the collapse of the regime may seem very sudden to outside observers — or even to the citizens themselves. Kuran calls this sudden change a “preference cascade,” and I wonder if that’s not what’s happening here."

Michael Marrus, a scholar of the Holocaust once said about the Holocaust and all its horror that there is a big difference between "knowing it" and "getting it".

The GOP has known it for a while, but refuses to "get it".

Freedom and liberty-loving individuals, who are not ashamed of the superiority of our Judeo-Christian civilization and heritage "get it".

Mark Steyn gets it.

Glenn Reynolds gets it.

If you "get it", you must live free or die-your spirit and soul will go first, and then your body will follow.